On the afternoon of Friday, 29 March, Pouria Zeraati was attacked by two men outside his home in south London. Slashed again and again with a knife, he suffered multiple stab wounds and was rushed to hospital. Fortunately he survived, and has since been discharged.
Zeraati is a journalist working for Iran International, a dissident TV news website broadcasting from London. Established in 2017 it has, according to independent surveys, become the most widely watched news channel in Iran, attracting twice as many viewers as BBC Persian. It is, of course, banned by the regime, and its audience has to access it via VPN, the virtual private network system familiar to many ex-pat viewers the world over.
The programs and interviews transmitted by Iran International are frank, and outspokenly opposed to the Islamist regime and its excesses. Which is why Iran’s IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps) has declared the station, along with BBC Persian, a “terrorist channel”.
It was on March 8, 2023, that Zaraati scored a media coup by persuading Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to be interviewed on air. Faced with the opportunity of addressing the Iranian public directly, Netanyahu pulled no punches in his condemnation of the Iranian regime, its leaders and its policies.
As he spoke Iran was in the throes of nationwide political turmoil following the death in police custody of Mahsa Amini the previous September. Amini had been arrested by the so-called morality police. Her crime was allegedly violating Iran’s mandatory Islamic dress code through inappropriate use of her hijab, or head covering.
News of her death circulated rapidly on social media,........